


us against the world

by dearly__beloved



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Percy Jackson Fusion, Asexuality, Bisexuality, Coming of Age, Demigods, Flashbacks, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, It's small, M/M, Percy Jackson AU, References to Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, Self-Acceptance, Slice of Life, With A Twist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:47:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25642312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dearly__beloved/pseuds/dearly__beloved
Summary: But surely if he was smart, Mark would have never signed the damn Friendship Pact Hades’ spawn offered him — no offense to Hades of course. He had heard from Renjun that he was a doting father that would send him pomegranates every week so that they could spend time together and play with Cerberus in the Underworld (who would have guessed that Cerberus loved playing catch and that Renjun would become his favorite?)A friendship pact and acceptance letter to UCLA land best friends and demigods Mark and Donghyuck in Montana to identify and find grizzly and black bears.moved to ao3 account hoelisticfind me here
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Comments: 22
Kudos: 188





	us against the world

Mark really should have never signed Donghyuck’s Friendship Pact when he first arrived at Camp Half-Blood. He was seven and his eyes were bright and curious about the fantastical world he was borne into because of his mother.

Being the son of Athena meant that Mark should have been smart and building rocket ships by the age of five and he did before he realized that Lego sets couldn’t withstand leaving the ozone layer without burning up and melting into an ugly burnt brown — but it appeared that Mark didn’t inherit his mother’s wisdom like the rest of siblings did.

He blames his dad sometimes for not letting him eat dirt like the rest of his classmates when he was in pre-school. There were some studies that showed that responsibly eating dirt helped build up immune systems.

At first Mark thinks that Lee Donghyuck is a son of Apollo; he sees Donghyuck carry a handful of sunflowers and play tag with a couple nymphs and other campers his age when he first arrives at Camp Half-Blood.

Donghyuck is around his height – maybe an inch or two shorter – and his copper hair captures all of the sunlight, leaving behind almost no warmth for the rest of the camp to enjoy during the summer.

He’s golden and smiles like the summer sun just; exactly like a son of Apollo should.

But Mark was only seven and he really didn’t know better because he hadn’t lived life yet.

When Mark was accepted to UCLA for biochemistry, he believed that perhaps he was smart after all. He may have received good marks in all of his AP courses, but he felt that it was the result of his good work ethic instead of attributing it to the intelligence he had inherited from his mother like the rest of his siblings did.

By the age of sixteen, another one of Athena’s kids – Taeil – had invented a small-time machine that mortals could use; the time machine only worked for a couple minutes at a time, but it had earned Taeil a Nobel Peace Prize and now he was off traveling around the world and sending other half-bloods to the camp wherever he encountered them.

But surely if he was smart, Mark would have never signed the damn Friendship Pact Hades’ spawn offered him — no offense to Hades of course. He had heard from Renjun that he was a doting father that would send him pomegranates every week so that they could spend time together and play with Cerberus in the Underworld (who would have guessed that Cerberus loved playing catch and that Renjun would become his favorite?)

How Mark ends up signing the damn Friendship Pact – or the devil’s contract as Mark should really call it or whatever monster Zeus sends his way – goes something like this:

When Mark was seven years old, his father sent him to Camp-Half Blood. It’s much earlier than the rest of the other half-blood children unless they were a child of the Big Three like Renjun and Taeyong were, but his father had meant well.

Too smart for his age, teachers were forced to have Mark skip three grade levels even though he was only in preschool and he was left with no friends when he made it to the big side of the playground.

And it’s another failed attempt for Mark to make friends his own age because apparently no matter how nice Johnny – a child of Dionysus Mark would learn later – was, he didn’t count because he was ten-years old. Mark’s teased for bringing gilgeori-toast instead of the “normal” peanut butter and jelly sandwich most children’s Hey Arnold and Spiderman lunchboxes are filled with and he’s teased for being so much smaller and younger than the rest of the other children; for children are cruel at this age for they haven’t learned empathy yet.

During his third week of at Camp Half-Blood – and a very lonely week he adds because he was the only child of Athena claimed that summer and her other children are too old to entertain him and ready to set off into the real world to become the next Hercules or Perseus – Mark finds a big hole next to the Arts and Crafts Center and peers at it.

It’s not a particularly big or small hole. The hole is just big enough to fit a small child and Mark finds himself becoming Alice in a fantastical land of yellow dandelions before he’s pulled away from the hole by a small hand.

“You shouldn’t go in there,” a small sun-kissed boy with curly brown hair says with a look that commands absolute attention. He’s the same little kid that arrived the same day as Mark at Camp Half-Blood, but Mark never got to hear his name, being pulled away by Johnny to introduce him to other campers.

The sun-kissed boy carries a pompous attitude that’s granted by the paper crown on his head. His shirt is one of those hand me down Rolling Stones t-shirts that’s a tad too big on him and his denim shorts are covered in whatever golden glitter failed to stick on his paper crown.

“My mom says to not go into strange places.”

“It’s not like anyone is going to miss me,” Mark says as he kicks a rock. “I don’t have any friends here.”

“What do you mean? You do have friends.”

“I do?” Mark asks, eyes wide. He had friends other than Johnny and Taeyong?

“If you sign this, I’ll be your friend,” the boy smiles and hands him a giant piece of pink construction paper with words messily written in dark blue crayon in all caps.

It’s a really pretty smile, Mark thinks as he clumsily signs the paper with a pen he had in his pocket. His dad always says to keep something to write with because he never knows what will happen, especially because he’s a demigod. He might die really really young and have to leave his dad all of his Marvel and Star Wars Lego sets to remember him by.

“We’ll be friends forever.”

The pact was really simple considering Donghyuck was only six-years old when he wrote it, but Mark believes that the three simple rules were too restricting for someone Donghyuck’s age to have come up with all by himself. Perhaps Donghyuck really was a child of Athena after all.

  * Do what Donghyuck wants.
  * Donghyuck will always come first.
  * Obey the rules above, and Donghyuck will always be your friend.



They ended up becoming Donghyuck & Mark or Markhyuck if you were to ask Renjun, who seemed to always look at the two with suspicious eyes; the son of Hades reminded Mark of a cat that would glare at you as you walked home from school.

Especially Mark, to who he always says:

“You’re whipped. Just accept it.”

(Donghyuck ends up re-writing the rules when he and Mark he’s eight and Mark is nine because his grammar had improved by then and he didn’t want the contract to be written in blue crayon on some scrapbook paper he had in his pocket from making paper crowns with Jaehyun.)

The first rule of the Friendship Contract is the reason why Mark took a plane from San Diego all the way to Montana at the end of his final summer break — the one right before entering college and leaving Camp Half-Blood for good.

Why you ask?

Donghyuck had found out he could take a test to confirm that he could differentiate the difference between a grizzly or black bear during the hunting season. He wasn’t interested in the second part – he was never one for hunting and killing monsters, much less doing it for sport – but rather the ability to claim that he could be a professional bear identifier and such claim had to be verified by a trip all the way to Montana.

It’s a weird fixation considering that Donghyuck had already become friends with the camp’s nymphs and was the pegasus’ favorite camper.

One would think the wild parables of fantasy and glory would be attractive to demi-gods like Mark and Donghyuck, but normalcy is what is coveted when you have monsters constantly chasing after you if you’re not careful enough. Mark swore that he end up with a head of white hair by the time he hit thirty because of how many monsters there were in San Diego (all because it has their favorite international airport. Even monsters hated LAX.)

((Mark doesn’t blame them. One of the LAX workers lost his luggage when he and his dad to South Korea to visit his grandmother. Sometimes he misses the green Camp Half-Blood sweater Donghyuck bought him for his birthday.))

And Mark by virtue of signing the Friendship Contract, was dragged all the way to the San Diego Airport at 6:45 AM on a Tuesday, carrying both Donghyuck’s and his own luggage as Donghyuck excitedly sings Red Velvet’s _Ice Cream Cake_. Mark showed his passport to the TSA officer and off they went to Montana (luckily the two were from the same county and could travel together instead of Mark having to transfer to a completely different airport to carry all of Donghyuck’s things.)

This is why Mark right now is bending down to his knees trying to catch his breathe. He was stupid and didn’t wear the right type of shoes he needed (he hear his mother’s disappointment in his head.)

Instead of the hiking boots he should have rented from the little cabin he saw on his way up, Mark wore his beat-up Sketchers and thought that the sneakers were enough to get by — and he truly believed that Donghyuck would give up the moment he saw the steep hills covered with large pines that could easily touch the sky and groves of little white weed flowers that went on for miles and miles without end.

He’s proven wrong when he sees Donghyuck unpack his luggage.

Seeing Donghyuck clad in tan short cargo shorts and hiking boots with a matching tan bucket-hat makes Mark realise that Donghyuck took this trip very seriously.

It would have been a lie if Mark said he wasn’t shocked by Donghyuck’s seriousness.

The last time Mark thinks that his best friend was completely serious was when he dated Yerim the summer when Donghyuck was fourteen and Mark was fifteen. Yerim was a pretty daughter of Demeter and Donghyuck would walk around the camp holding Yerim’s hand every day and letting her cut him when the lunch line was too long so that she could get one of the coveted double chocolate chip brownies everyone wanted.

But the week of “serious” dating ended the Friday of the same week Yerim asked him out.

Mark never got a proper answer from Donghyuck as to why the broke up other than a shrug and Donghyuck making him sign another friendship contract.

Unlike the second revamped version, this contract is typed and printed out in the camp’s only computer and folded with a crease in the middle Mark thinks it’s because Donghyuck most likely mistyped something and Chiron didn’t want him to waste anymore ink.

The rules remain the same and Mark sighs.

He knows that the contract shouldn’t be valid anymore, but in spite of Donghyuck’s whining and antics, he made a good friend and the only one Mark’s been able to keep throughout the years. Renjun had left the camp early to embark on his own hero’s journey and took Yukhei with him. Taeyong and Johnny had turned eighteen much before Mark did and Jisung was already attached to the hip to Na Jaemin — another child of Aphrodite Mark met when he was thirteen years old. Jaemin was a new camper from the Bay Area and quickly claimed by Aphrodite the moment he arrived at Camp Half-Blood.

“Are you dating my brother?” is the first thing Jaemin says to Mark when they met.

“What?”

“I guess I was wrong,” Jaemin frowns, dyed pink bangs falling on his eyes. “I’m usually never wrong about this things though. I’m much better than Cupid at these kinds of things but you didn’t hear that from me. But I am Buzzfeed certified so has to count for something.”

He stares at Mark for a couple more seconds before his gaze slightly softens. “I should probably ask Jaehyun if my intuition is off. I don’t want to lose my Buzzfeed internship because of you. I need this to convince my dad not to enroll me in another SAT prep course.”

The new child of Aphrodite goes off to his cabin, leaving behind a confused Mark.

So, Mark goes with whatever Donghyuck wants in the end and now he’s carrying his black Jan sport backpack, as well as Donghyuck’s yellow North Face Borealis up the hill.

Maybe it’s because Donghyuck is a son of Aphrodite, Mark feels compelled to do everything that Donghyuck asks of him.

Because everyone falls in love with children of Aphrodite at some point during their time at Camp Half-Blood.

He remembers when Doyoung – a child of Demeter – became smitten with Jaehyun when he was seventeen and on the verge of matriculating into university.

Doyoung had never really shown interest in anyone or anything other than his dancing succulent plants and ended up dating Jaehyun for the remainder of their year at Camp Half-Blood.

“Don’t you think it’s weird that everyone makes kissing faces at them?” Mark asks Donghyuck as the walk back to their cabins. His hoodie is drenched in sweat and he can feel his bangs becoming stuck to his forehead (he’s definitely going to have to shower after dinner. Dry shampoo and AXE deodorant can only do so much.) Donghyuck doesn’t look much better either, his old Michael Jackson band-shirt slightly frayed from wood-chopping the entire afternoon.

“Why?”

“It just…”

“Just?”

“I dunno…like I don’t know what people mean when they say they feel butterflies in their stomach? Like are you supposed to feel your heart flutter when you’re with someone attractive? I don’t really get it.”

“Do you feel like you’ve never liked someone before?” Donghyuck asks, eyes on Mark and no one else.

“I think so…maybe once?” Mark pauses. “But I never imagined myself wanting to go beyond holding hands and kissing. Anything else…like sex and more physical things…um…well they make me uncomfortable to think about them. Like I don’t really imagine myself doing anything like _that_.” 

He didn’t mean to place emphasis on the last part but —

Mark’s never really told anyone this before, about his sexuality or well lack of it. Not even his mother or father. Ever.

Mark’s never been sure what to make of it when he realized that he never really had a crush on someone before. Sure, he’s said that a certain celebrity was attractive in passing and would laugh at sex jokes because it was something he observed that’s been funny, but Mark only did it so that he could fit in with everyone else not because he found anyone sexually attractive.

Online forums were kind of helpful — but some users still said that they masturbated and still had sex with their partners, but the idea of sex never came to Mark naturally. Sex didn’t live in his mind rent free — one literally had to try to shove the idea of sex in Mark’s head for it to even manifest as a thought.

“Well I’m glad you told me Mark,” a small smile blooms on Donghyuck’s face. “I’m really happy that you felt comfortable telling me this.”

“You’re not going to ask me how do I know if I’ve never had sex or kissed someone?” Mark’s eyes open wide, trying to process what Donghyuck just told him.

“No. I think that I should respect how you feel about love and those kinds of things,” he asserts and flicks Mark’s forehead. “Don’t you remember rule number three of our friendship pact? I will always be your friend. But please let me know if there’s anything I do that makes you uncomfortable.”

Donghyuck leans in to give Mark a hug, but he hesitates for a moment.

“Am I still allowed to hug you?”

Unlike his usual boisterous voice, it comes out small and afraid like a little kitten that’s lost in the blankets that once kept it warmth.

Mark smiles.

“Always.”  


Donghyuck is finally recognized as a son of Aphrodite when he’s eight and Mark is nine years old.

Everyone had expected that Donghyuck would have been claimed by Apollo because he was a child made out of gold.

Everything about Donghyuck was warm, from his copper hair to caramel skin.

He was honey like the rest of Apollo’s children.

Mark would have compared him to the sun, but the giant star is too selfish to ever let anyone fully appreciate its beauty without having to resort to some sort of artificial mechanism.

Honey was a much more appropriate comparison Mark thinks.

Because in spite of his jokes and clinginess, Donghyuck always adjusted his personality to whoever he was with to make them more comfortable. With Jeno, he was calm and didn’t bounce around like a puppy. And with Renjun, he allowed himself to be witty and snarky to remind the child of Hades that his birth didn’t mean he had to be some gloomy version of Moomin. In fact, Donghyuck bought him a bright green Moomin mug on Renjun’s birthday and casted it tiny little hearts that would appear whenever Renjun needed to be reminded that he was loved.

So, when Apollo claims Yukhei instead of Donghyuck, everyone is surprised; even Chiron looks shocked that Donghyuck was not a child of Apollo.

Donghyuck was so much better than everyone else at archery and he never missed his target. Not once in all of the years Mark had seen Donghyuck polish his skills. When he released his arrow, it was as if a sparrow had flown and taken its small prey, wings never making themselves known.

Instead, Donghyuck is welcomed into Aphrodite’s cabin and he’s adopted by Jaehyun and Sicheng who dote on him because he’s the youngest until Chenle comes a couple years later and everyone becomes enamored with the little boy from Shanghai. Donghyuck doesn’t seem to mind that he was Aphrodite’s child instead of Apollo and simply shrugs if anyone asks if he was disappointed by the result.

But Donghyuck remains Mark’s favorite person from Aphrodite’s cabin.

“Didn’t I tell you that my dad is an Olympic archery champion?” Donghyuck says as he and Mark watch the fireflies light up the camp sky with soft yellow. “He met my mom when he was competing for gold in South Korea.”

Donghyuck shows him a picture of a four-year-old version of himself with his father. Donghyuck looked nothing like his father except for his caramel brown hair, so Mark assumed that he took after Aphrodite. Which was weird considering that the goddess of love and beauty’s appearance was ever changing and in Mark’s mind, Donghyuck was still the little boy with a paper crown on his head asking him to sign a silly friendship pact.

“Come on Mark! You’re lagging!” Donghyuck yells out from the top of the hill. He’s waving frantically at Mark, who’s still trying to catch his breath. He’s never been good at sports or anything of the sorts, always having to rely on the other children from his cabin or Donghyuck whenever they had to play capture the flag.

He stops, trying to find some reprieve. Honestly if he were a child of the Big Three, Mark probably would have been a goner had a monster realized how quickly he tired out and could have eaten him in a flash. But ever since he met his mother for the third time and told her that he had no interest in becoming a hero of the sorts like Renjun and Yukhei, she seemed to have understood his worries.

“There are other ways for you to become a hero,” she said handing Mark a locket. One he learns that is able to act as some sort of monster repellent. “You don’t have to fight monsters like your siblings do to be great.”

He decides to become a doctor that day.

Donghyuck runs all the way down and he looks like a little deer trying to find its way home, eyes bright and alert.

He bends down and motions Mark to come closer. “I’ll give you a piggyback ride. Get on.”

Mark comments, “Do you think you can carry me all the way to the forest?”

“Why not?” Donghyuck huffs. “I’ve always been able to do anything I’ve put my mind on.”

Donghyuck doesn’t have to tell Mark “trust me.”

Mark lets Donghyuck carry him all the way to the top of the hill and he’s able to enjoy how pretty the dandelions are, still rooted because summer decided it wasn’t cruel enough to turn them white and let them fly through the air only to be reborn for the next year.

He knows that Donghyuck won’t let him fall.

Donghyuck’s never failed Mark.

Not once.

Friendship pact or not.

Donghyuck will always be Mark’s friend.

“What’s wrong?” Donghyuck tilts his head. He comes closer to Mark and leans on his shoulder. “Why are you sad?”

It’s kind of stupid if he thinks about it. Mark knows that he’s not entitled to having more of his mother considering all of his siblings and all of the responsibilities she has, but he still yearns for more.

He’s heard Doyoung say the same thing, that he wants Demeter to spend at least one day with him. Even an hour would have been nice. And he knows that Aphrodite always makes time for her kids and would send them flowers every week, so maybe Donghyuck might not be able to empathize with how he’s feeling right now (probably because that was the only living thing she acknowledged was just as beautiful as her. Donghyuck did say that even though his mother was loving, she’d always find a way to compliment herself.)

In his hands is a copy of Pokémon Sapphire, it’s internal battery already dried up from years of use and the only present he’s received from his mother.

The blue plastic had no scratches and you could still vividly make out the bright gold letters, but its interior was damaged and refused to give more.

“Did it stop working?”

“Yeah,” Mark mutters, dejected. His eyes keep steady on the old Pokémon game in his hands, paying no attention to Donghyuck’s worried gaze. Before his mind can drift to even more sadness, Donghyuck takes the game out of Mark’s hands.

“I’m invoking rule one of our friendship pact right now. I’m taking your game.” And Aphrodite’s son runs off with Mark’s Pokémon game.

Two days later, Donghyuck comes back with Mark’s game all good and running.

“How did you fix it?”

Donghyuck never tells Mark, but he hears from Jisung who heard from Jaemin that Donghyuck snuck out of the camp to get the internal battery replacement the game needed and was reprimanded by Jaehyun – the Aphrodite Cabin head – for leaving without telling anyone.

Mark takes Donghyuck strawberry picking to make it up to him the next day, the two the only ones occupying the strawberry fields even though Mark would much rather eat watermelons that summer (he really owed Jungwoo a favor for that one and ended up cleaning up the pegasus stalls for an entire week.)

“Is that a grizzly bear or a black bear?” Donghyuck mumbles to himself as he hides in the bush. Mark is still on his back, finding himself comfortable — he was too lazy to get off and it meant that he didn’t need to worry about the rest of the uphill battle to find more bears. He didn’t really care to find out the difference between the two species of bear, but Donghyuck mentioned something about grizzly bears having a prominent shoulder bump and having a dish-shaped profile.

“Hmm…it’s definitely a black bear. It has a straight profile even though it has a golden color…”

People think that children of Aphrodite aren’t smart or kind. That they always focus on the love letters and chocolates they keep under their beds and thinking about how pretty they are simply because their mother is Aphrodite.

Donghyuck certainly none of those things Mark thinks as he hangs out with him.

He never accepts any love letters that come his way and he’s the one that sends hug coupons around Camp Half-Blood if anyone ever needs a hug. One-time Mark sees Jisung use one after receiving a call that his dog got injured and he couldn’t fly back to Atlanta in time for his surgery. Luckily Jisung’s dog makes a fast recovery and Jisung shows everyone his cute little pomeranian puppy on the cracked screen of his iPhone.

And Donghyuck actually kept straight A’s in all of his classes judging by the fact that he was the number one person in his class and on track on becoming valedictorian. An impressive feat considering he attended in a well-known magnet school and was already enrolled in a full course load of AP classes including AP Spanish Literature. There were times that Donghyuck would curse in Spanish playing Kartrider.

“¡No mames, güey! Don’t push me when I’m trying to drift,” Donghyuck curses trying to finish the last lap of his race before dinner. He wins and ends up permanately keeping his avatar’s little teddy bear backpack.

Mark thinks that Donghyuck is probably smarter than him too. If he were to be any of the gods’ son, Donghyuck should have definitely been a son of Athena.

Donghyuck was certainly too kind. Right now, he should be here chasing after bears with his new girlfriend Eunji, one of Hermes’ kids. She’s really pretty and sweet, her long black hair tied up with a big bow in a high ponytail — she looks like every high school sweetheart you see in kdramas like _Love Alarm_ and _Hi! School: Love On_ _._ A clean image and twinkling eyes that made your heart melt when there was ever sadness reflected in them.

And it may be Eunji’s last year at Camp Half-Blood too considering that she had skipped a grade level and was already accepted at Cal Poly SLO to pursue a degree in wine and viticulture.

Mark saw Eunji begin clinging to Donghyuck when they were helping the younger campers make friendship bracelets. Usually it was the Hermes Cabin that would take charge, but Mark ended up losing a game of rock paper scissors with Kunhang and Donghyuck tagged along by virtue of the Friendship Pact. Kind of like the two for one deal Mark would get at Costco when he was buying Lays — but without the eating out Donghyuck part if that made sense (he shouldn’t have spent that much time with Ten when he came back to teach everyone about sword fighting the other week...)

He sees Donghyuck’s face lit up around Eunji and he laughs at her jokes. Eunji is just as bright and sunny as Donghyuck and they look good together. Much better looking than Donghyuck dragging Mark wherever he went because Mark didn’t have that many friends outside of him and the rest of Aphrodite’s Cabin.

They look like Melody and Kurumi together and definitely without the 200k+ enemies to lovers slow burn the author could never dream of writing because she’s lazy and unmotivated.

Donghyuck shouldn’t have dragged Mark with him considering that they would always be friends and his time with Eunji would be —

“Mark do you really think that I shouldn’t have asked you to be the one to come with me all the way to Montana instead of Eunji?” Donghyuck huffs as he lets Mark fall on his butt. Luckily the grass was soft and full of tiny little flowers that cushioned his fall. “And before you think about it, yes you said that all aloud you big doofus. Honestly for being one of Athena’s kids, you’re a little too oblivious and dumb.

“You’re my best friend, of course I would always choose you first and especially before anyone else even if I _was_ dating Eunji. And I am _not_ dating her. Don’t you dare forget that’s in our contract.” He points at Mark’s chest, but there’s no malice of any kind. Just annoyance. “It’s rule number four.”

“Rule number four?” Mark blinks. “But there’s only three rules from what I know.” That he’s absolutely certain of. The Friendship Pact only has three rules and three rules Mark had almost tattooed to his calf because of a dare he lost against Jeno last summer (good thing Jeno got distracted by his high school exit exams to remember the dare or else Mark would have had the Friendship Pact permanently etched in Papyrus font on his body.)

The rules have always been (even if Mark considered them to be in Donghyuck’s favor only sometimes; but he grew to learn that Donghyuck would never do anything to hurt him.):

  * Do what Donghyuck wants.
  * Donghyuck will always come first.
  * Obey the rules above, and Donghyuck will always be your friend.



“Did you ever read _all_ of the rules Mark?” Donghyuck asks Mark and the latter shakes his head “no”. Donghyuck huffs again – Mark swears that Donghyuck rolled his eyes at him – and looks through his backpack for a bit. And throwing out a couple swords – how Donghyuck go them past the TSA and how they all fit in his backpack Mark will never find out because apparently the North Face backpacks fit more than just MacBook Pros now and those astronaut themed decomposition notebooks now – and bags of trail mix and a couple Hydro flasks later, he finally finds the said contract.

He hands Mark the sheet of old sheet of paper that had somehow found a way to remain un-crumpled and unblemished by all of the snacks and weapons Donghyuck stored in case a monster attacks them — there were no monsters unless you counted the nice satyr community that ran the local dinner they had breakfast at that morning.

Looking at the paper now, there’s the small crease in the middle Mark’s never bothered to open until today. It’s small and carefully folded, but the crease is definitely there and it’s deeper than how Mark remembered it being.

“Unfold it.”

Mark complies and unfolds the small crease, still trying to process that there was in fact a fourth rule to the Friendship Pact.

  * Do what Donghyuck wants.
  * Donghyuck will always come first.
  * Don’t forget that Donghyuck will always love you, so you will always come first for him.
  * Obey the rules above, and Donghyuck will always be your friend.



“You love me?” Mark dumbly blurts out.

“Why else would I take you with me all the way to Montana if I didn’t love you?” Donghyuck immediately replies back. “Of course, I love you. And yes, I mean I love you in the sense that I wouldn’t want to just be your bro before you start misunderstanding and start bro-zoning me. I love you in the sense I would like to marry you one day and adopt a cute little poodle with you. Well if one of us isn’t eaten by a kraken before we turn old and all that cute k-drama stuff, but I would probably go to the Underworld for you and bring you back no matter what Hades says,” he says and crosses his arms.

“But what about Eunji? Aren’t you dating her?”

Donghyuck huffs again, “Where did you get that stupid idea from? I’m not dating Eunji and if I was, why would I confess to you in the first place?”

“But…I saw you — I saw her…”

“You didn’t see the whole thing then,” Donghyuck sighs leaning in closer. “I rejected her because I already liked someone and for a very long time before then.”

“How long?”

“A very long time if you need to know. I realized that I loved you when Yerim told me I couldn’t hang out with you anymore. She said that it wasn’t normal for me to place our friendship before her and she gave me an ultimatum…and I…”

“You chose me,” Mark finishes. “You chose me.”

“Yeah.

“But I’m fine if you want to forget this and want to just stay friends.” Instead of blossoming like the honeysuckles on the bushes surrounding them, Donghyuck retreats. Instead of the boy with the giant paper crown on his head he’s used to seeing, Mark is reminded that even if Donghyuck seems invincible and able to take on the world for the both of them, he’s still someone that is human.

He’s someone that wants to be loved and he knows that falling in love with Mark isn’t something that will ascertain that need because he’s very well aware that Mark’s emotional and physical needs will always be different than his own.

Yet, Donghyuck is always against the world for Mark and is willing to let himself be dumped by love if it meant that he could still be on Mark’s side. And for some reason today, Donghyuck looks really pretty underneath the sunset’s orange glow. His hazel eyes catch golden and orange flecks and his face is rosy pink from his love confession.

Mark isn’t quite sure if he feels butterflies flutter like Doyoung did when he crushed on Jaehyun and he isn’t quite sure if he feels that he’ll ever want to go beyond kissing, but seeing Donghyuck all flustered and shy, Mark now knows that he really likes Donghyuck too even if it’s not the same exact way Donghyuck likes him.

Not because Donghyuck is pretty and because he’s a son of Aphrodite and everyone falls in love with children of Aphrodite at some point of their lives.

But because Donghyuck is Donghyuck.

And like the protagonist of some kdrama he illegally streamed on KissAsian because he was too cheap to pay for the premium version of Viki, Mark leans in and —

“We don’t have to kiss if it makes you uncomfortable,” Donghyuck interrupts as he reaches for Mark’s hand. His cheeks are tinted a little soft pink and his fingers feel sweaty brushing against Mark’s. “I can wait, you know. I’ll always wait for you.”

Mark intertwines his fingers with Donghyuck.

He smiles.

Mark thinks that the summer before entering college has definitely changed him. He never would have thought that being dragged all the way to Montana to watch black and grizzly bears would have ended up with him dating his best friend, but change doesn’t mean that things are bad.

Mark tells Donghyuck he loves him for the very first time when he has to move out to Los Angeles, luggage ready and tied to the top of his dad’s Honda Civic.

Mark ends up finally kissing Donghyuck when he’s accepted at UCLA the following spring.

The moment he kisses Donghyuck, Mark can finally see why he’s a son of Aphrodite instead of a son of Apollo.

Because when he’s with Donghyuck, he feels love.

Obviously Mark and Donghyuck have to kill a couple harpies and a couple krakens and defeat Medusa and save Donghyuck’s dog from the Underworld all while having to deal with Chenle constantly bombarding them with a K-i-s-s-i-n-g! song video from the dark depths of YouTube before Mark can even tell Donghyuck he loves him, much less kiss him.

But Mark ends up not caring that he’s a demigod anymore.

Donghyuck is always going to be on his side no matter what.

Because Donghyuck is his boyfriend and best friend.

Always.

**Author's Note:**

> I was listening to Epik High’s US Against the World and this fic was born. And I’m ace and wanted more ace fics here (although I'm going to say for the rest of my fics except the kitten one, I don't really have a canon sexuality for any of the characters, so feel free to interpret them as you please. Fanfics are for all of you out there regardless of your gender and sexual identity.) I'm tempted to write more asexual-centric pieces...but I have a couple other wip I have. Maybe I'll make a twitter poll...
> 
> Please be kind and leave comments and kudos. Til next time...I’m probably going to go back to playing kartrider with my gc...
> 
> twitter: @hoelistic98 and moved to hoelistic on ao3


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